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Portrait of Titan arum

Nature · Ferns, grasses & other plants

Titan arum

Inflorescence to 3 m · first flowered at Kew 1889 · IUCN Endangered

Amorphophallus titanum — Araceae

The titan arum has the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world, standing up to three metres tall: a tall spike, the spadix, wrapped in a single frilled collar, the spathe, green outside and deep maroon within. It is not one flower but hundreds of tiny ones packed round the base of the spadix. When it opens, for a day or two, it heats itself and releases a stench of rotten flesh to draw carrion beetles and flesh flies. It is endemic to the rainforests of Sumatra and is Endangered.

How to spot them

  • ▸A single enormous pale spike (spadix) rising from a pleated maroon-lined collar (spathe), up to 3 m tall
  • ▸No leaves at all when flowering; between flowerings, one single tree-sized leaf on a mottled stalk
  • ▸An overpowering smell of rotting meat, strongest in the first evening
  • ▸Grows from an enormous underground corm that can exceed 100 kg
  • ▸Native only to western Sumatra; in Britain seen in glasshouses, always with a queue outside

How to know it

It has the largest unbranched inflorescence of any plant, standing up to three metres tall

The titan arum — a record distinct from Rafflesia's largest single flower.

What looks like one giant flower is hundreds of tiny ones round the base of a spike, inside a single frilled collar

The titan arum; the spike is the spadix and the collar the spathe.

Female flowers open and close before the male ones shed pollen, which prevents self-pollination

The titan arum — protogyny, over about 12 to 24 hours.

It heats its spike and releases dimethyl trisulfide to imitate a carcass, drawing carrion beetles and flesh flies

The titan arum — the second plant called the corpse flower.

It first flowered outside its native Sumatra at Kew in 1889, and has drawn crowds there ever since

The titan arum.

Between flowerings its corm, which can exceed 100 kg, throws up a single leaf the size of a small tree

The titan arum.

Its generic name, from the Greek, means 'misshapen phallus'

Amorphophallus titanum.

Quick-fire facts

  • •Has the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world, standing up to 3 m above the ground (Kew)
  • •Endemic to the rainforests of western Sumatra, Indonesia, and listed as Endangered by the IUCN, chiefly through deforestation
  • •The inflorescence is a spadix surrounded by a spathe, green to cream outside and deep burgundy inside
  • •Protogynous: the female flowers are receptive first and close after 12 to 24 hours, after which the male flowers shed pollen
  • •The stink, mainly dimethyl trisulfide and related sulphur compounds, mimics carrion; the spadix also warms itself to spread the scent
  • •First flowered outside Sumatra at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in 1889
  • •Described by the Italian botanist Odoardo Beccari, who found it in Sumatra in 1878
  • •The corm is among the largest of any plant, recorded at over 100 kg
  • •Between flowerings it produces a single vast compound leaf, several metres tall, which dies back before the next cycle
  • •A member of the arum family, Araceae — the family of the cuckoo pint, the aroids and taro

Drill it — 8 cards

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Sources